Tag: sexual abuse victims

Very puzzling, but markedly less infuriating than the sexual abuse and cover-up scandal shrouding Penn State University, is the thoughtless, pigskin-headed response last night by student mobs to the sackings of the university president and, much more of an issue, the football coach.

Watching a news conference held by the university’s board of trustees vice-chair, John Surma Jr., there was an audible gasp of indignation from assembled media and students alike as the forced resignations were announced. In the questions that followed it was easy to distinguish between journalists who had a bit of perspective on the tragedy of the abuse scandal and its victims and those muscle-heads who were apparently thinking only of the fabled football program, its storied coach and the team’s next game on Saturday.

How and when was the coach advised of the board decision? Was it in person or over the phone?

From the board’s perspective, while voicing concern for the victims and their families, it clearly had a larger agenda: salvaging or re-building Penn State’s reputation among prospective students, staff, alumni and funders.

And while there were a few compassionate questions at the presser concerning the board’s relationship to the victims I couldn’t help feeling that most of the concern among those assembled was for the octogenarian coach, Joe Paterno, who seems to be among those who either engaged in an exercise of plausible deniability or unconscionable cover-up which led to the victimization of even more boys.